Zootopia - Heart Attack
by djk19981998
Summary: After the Bellwether incident, society began to reinvent itself—many of the subdued prejudices animals held towards one another started to slip away. But as society improved, evil grew. A series of serial killings involving bunnies racks the city of Zootopia, and Judy and Nick are tasked with stopping it.
1. Chapter 1

Judy brushed her badge off; looking at her reflection, she placed her paws on her hips and pushed out her chest. In the florescent light of her room, her kevlar supported suit appeared an almost black blue, and the dark pieces of kevlar looked as though they were part of the her shadow. Her left cheek rose up in a close-mouthed smile. "Ready." She spun around, her eye catching on the minute shine her brass badge gave off as the meek light hit it just right, and went for the door.

The two pictures on her wall lifted on their hinges—a large object, probably one of the two gazelles next door, had slammed against the wall.

"Why did you delete my high score?" This one's voice came directly from his nose—it gave it a higher pitch.

"I didn't—I just beat it."

"Yeah, right!"

Another slam. A couple months ago, she'd have been over there trying to dispel the situation, but she'd learned the brotherly duo bickered out of friendship. That, or they forgot about cop living next door.

Judy walked up to the police station. They'd built it out of a light yellow rock in an expansive, cylindrical shape—rectangular pillars stretched up and held up a gray rim at the top.

The door's handle stood a good two Judys high—creatures smaller than her had rat-like holes drilled into the pillars next to the doors, and a circular, blue button with a white-bunny's paw inscribed was the method for animals of Judy's size. But she had other methods. Starting from the stairs, she ran towards a pillar and jumped towards it—one foot connected with the sturdy, hard rock, and propelled her towards the push-handle. Her arm connected, and the door swung open. Judy's momentum carried her through the now-opening door and towards the floor—she slammed into it, but rolled before the force could break her shoulder. With the momentum, she sprang up into a standing position.

A determined grin had spread across her face; she tried to do that every day.

Judy walked—with a little bounce in her step—to the counter. "Clawhauser?"

"Judeyh!" A cat peered over the counter, donut in his mouth. His paw hesitated over the donut, but he pulled it out of his mouth. "I think Chief Bogo was looking for ya." Judy's grin couldn't help but widen—the leopard's always had a smile across his wide cheeks. "He's in the office—but I'd knock first. Give him a chance to hide the Gazelle app." Clawhauser let out an airy, high pitched laugh, and Judy giggled.

"I'll be sure to."

With a wave, she bounded towards Bogo's office; getting called in personally was odd. He normally assigned cases in the bullpen.

Judy knocked on his door. "Come in." Chief Bogo sat with his arms splayed out on the table. "Hopps—take a seat."

Her breath caught in her throat. Had she done something wrong? Did she forget a piece of protocol when arresting that wolf yesterday? Miss a part of her report? Accidentally sleep through an entire day?

"Hopps." Chief Bogo's voice sounded just like an male ox's should: deep, throaty, and jarring. It brought her back, and she walked forward. She hopped to the edge of the seat, and she pulled herself the rest of the way up.

"Yesterday, there were five murders in the main district—this district. All of them between one and one thirty in the morning, and all of them bunnies." Judy cringed. "I want you and Nick on this now."

"Sir." She gave him a salute and jumped from the chair, her legs absorbing the shock from the fall. A growl crawled up from her throat, and her paws collapsed into fists.

Back in the main room, a pair of familiar paws gripped her shoulder. "Heya, Sweetheart."

Judy shrugged off the paws. "Nick, we've got a case."

Nick stared at her. "Well, hello to you too."

Judy continued. "Five bunnies turned up dead yesterday in central." Her fists were still curled up into balls, and her lips were tight as if holding back a scream.

"Alright, I'll grab the case file. You get the car." Nick didn't wait for her response. Judy turned to look at him, his fluffy tail waving behind him as he ran to Clawhauser, before going to the cruiser. For the most part, his fur was a burnt orange. The tips of his ears melded into a light black, and the underside of his muzzle turned an off white that continued down his neck. Her grey fur seemed brighter next to his. And, like Judy, deeper parts of his ancestors' anatomy remained; his legs led up to a sharp, flat bone end that gave way to a thigh.

Judy stared out the front window. A tree rustled lightly in the breeze, a tiger couple and their child walking underneath it. She wondered if those bunnies were parents. "They were bunnies," she mumbled with a sigh, "and we are good at multiplying." A laugh barely reverberated from her chest. She remembered when she'd used that line on Nick. It was the second time she'd met the fox, and he'd ended up being a key witness to a missing animals case. They were the least of the problem. Despite being the root of the case, they were mere pawns in a game being played by the prior mayor. She had attempted to turn the prey majority against the predator minority by using a poisonous compound to turn predatorial animals back into primitive beings—and were it not for Judy and Nick, the species war would have been successful.

Perhaps it had been afterall. Finally letting out that scream, Judy punched the front dash, and she dealt with the accompanying pain for a good ten seconds before clasping the paw with the other. "They didn't deserve it…"

Nick had entered the car sometime during her disassociated rampage—he kept his eyes trained on her. "Sorry, Carrots." The sides of her lips tilted up, though so slightly that only Judy knew they had moved. Over the past month, Nick's little pet name had grown on her. "But the only way we can honor them is solving this case."

A brief sigh filled the cruiser. "Thanks, Nick…ie." She shook her head and laughed, and this time it came from an open tooth-grin mouth without anger weighing it down. "Not feeling that one." Jangling the keys, she slid one into the ignition and started it up. "I'll have to keep shooting for my Carrots."

"Just Carrots?" He scoffed, hitting her on the shoulder with a barely-formed fist. "You don't give me enough credit, Fluff-butt."

Judy glared at the fire-orange fox. "Don't call me that, dumb-fox."

He laughed, leaning back into the leather seat. From the nape of his suit, he pulled off a pair of gold-rimmed sunglasses and affixed them at the base of his muzzle. His posture said nothing, but Judy knew it meant 'let's go.'

The case file pointed them to the first murder site, 583 North Pawster, Apartment C650. Unfortunately, the first letter of the number indicated the floor, and this building didn't have an elevator.

Judy and Nick panted against a sixth story wall. Both of their suits stuck to them with fresh perspiration. "Stairs were my least favorite part the academy," Judy stated between gasps.

"Same."

Despite their exhausted state, it only took half a minute before their breathing steadies again. Finding the apartment posed no challenge compared to the stairs, and Nick opened the door for Judy. Even the fox's night vision couldn't pierce through the darkness in the room. Blackout curtains covering the window across from the door prevented light from filtering in. Judy flicked on a light as they enter. The hallway led into a larger room that split into a living room and a kitchen. On one wall of the living room, a door led to a now-abandoned bedroom. A couch and TV sat in the living room.

The tape markings were on the floor in front of the couch. But this did not make Judy growl. It was what she thought were artistic red splotches on the couch.

Judy flips open the file to the page on this scene. Nothing. No leads, no evidence. And after a two hour long scan of the entire apartment, they've found nothing to add to the list. So they move on to the next scene, and the next scene, and the next scene; each offers no evidence or leads, and each causes Judy's smile to drop further and further into a scowl.

As the crimefighting duo sat in the cruiser, Judy flipped through the case file again. "There's gotta be something that we're missing…"

Nick shut the red booklet. "There is—"

Judy ears perked up. "What? What did we—" A claw covered her mouth.

"There is, but we aren't going to find it unless we sleep." For the first time that night, Judy looked at the clock. 2:00. Simply knowing how long they'd been at it made her eyes heavier. Giving in to the weight, she leaned her head against Nick's shoulder.


	2. Chapter 2

Judy's eyes opened to darkness. A crushing presence began emanating from her chest—it reminded her of the times her family dogpiled, stacking up dozens of bunnies high, creating that adorable crushing weight. This time, she did not laugh. Her breath came out in quick, shallow breaths, and her paws grappled at the fabric to her sides. It bunched up with every clench of her paws. She was in bed, in her room, brought here by Nick after she fell asleep in the cruiser—she knew. But the weight continued to crush her.

Shadows flickered around the edges of her vision. Some took on the form of monsters she had conjured up in her head, of the villain who brought a gun to the bank robbery, or the sheep that shot up Bunny Borough—she knew they were constructs of her mind, but they felt real. They surrounded her and closed in. As she felt their anger, shivers ran through her aching body—it hurt. Everything hurt.

A light overcame the darkness to her right accompanied by a grating buzz, like an open electric wire—in that darkness, those pieces of reality were all she had. And she clung to them. The poison paralyzing her limbs began to gently trickle out, starting from the point closest to her heart and radiating downwards. Then she felt the shivers. Accompanying each one was a sharp breath. That pressure had faded, too, though she only noticed with each breath, then forgot.

She lifted up a paw, letting to go of the bedsheet, and heard that familiar tear of separation; sweat coated her skin. The shivers had begun to spread out, so she kicked off the comforter, and laid back against her pillow. As she stared at the ceiling, her breath became increasingly rhythmic. "Thank God."

That same buzz filled the room once more.

She peeled herself from the bed—most of her body still stuck to the fabric—and stood up. For a moment, she had to place a paw on her bed. Her legs felt weak, but they quickly regained their strength.

She walked to her phone. After unlocking it, she grinned at the picture of herself and Nick in the background; he's doing bunny ears behind her while wearing this genuine smile, one that splits his face from cheek to cheek, and she's shoving back into the side of his torso with an equally sheer expression of joy. A shiver knocked her out of the past. She flicked down the status bar and saw she'd missed two texts from Nick.

"I hope this doesn't wake you up. I just wanted to say that we did some great work today. We'll get him tomorrow. Rest up."

She smirked, then continued.

"Oh, and I got stuck marathoning a show—I'll be in bed after this episode… probably."

Her claws hovered above the keyboard, but they shut the phone off instead. She'll tell him later.

After padding over to a dresser, she replaced her suit with some sweats, a faded-pink t-shirt, and a hoodie. She took a deep breath and looked in the mirror; her irises had shifted to a darker purple hue, but her rapid blinks did nothing to bring back the lighter hue. With a nod, she twisted on her heel and headed out of her apartment. The hall was silent. Even her neighbors were quiet. And as she stepped out into the frigid cold of the night, she pulled the strings on her hoodie and padded down the sidewalk.

The street lamps illuminated the sidewalk in intermittent patches. As she walked between them, her shadow elongated and squished, switching from her front to her back over and over—she shuddered. The cold seeped right through her hoodie, but the cold in Bunny Borough was worse; she shook at the shadows. They looked like demons, reaping the fear they caused her. And as they wished, this uncomfortable presence began to rise in her—it started in her paws, then flowed up her body. Even though the cold forced her to consider reality, she ignored it. This feeling of dread... somebody was tailing her. Run. Run—she needed to run.

She ducked off into an alleyway and slumped against a wall, letting herself slowly slide to the ground. A breath, then another breath. Her left paw latched onto the opposite arm and squeezed, hard. Her claws stabbed her skin. She held on, and tightened, and tightens, and tears flowed down her rounded cheeks—that's when she let go, but it was subconscious. The pain in her arm remains. It throbs. And with every throb, fresh tears well in her squinted irises before falling. She slams the paw at the end of her throbbing arm against the wall and then cradles it to her chest. Gritting her teeth, she growled.

"Dang it, dang it…"

Judy sat there until she lost herself—until she lost track of time, of feeling the cool sensation of tears streaking down her cheeks. As her shuddering breaths returned to normal and the patches of wet fur on her cheeks began to dry, she stood, leaning against the wall for support. Her arm still ached. It stung where her claws had punctured, but the pain continually dulled. She cursed, taking in sharp breaths to compensate for the pain radiating from her arm, and began to leave the alleyway.

Something fell over, clanging onto the cement floor—the noise reverberated on the close, brick walls, and brought the crunching metal right behind her. After her ears swiveled towards the sound, Judy spun around on her heel, still clutching her aching arm, and scanned the alleyway. Darkness. The light from the streetlamps faded out a few feet into the alley, and then a pure black took over. Taking a long, slow breath, she pulled out her phone and turned the camera's light towards the alley.

She scanned the alley. From the trash cans on the right, the light jerked to the right, illuminating yet more nothing. Her chest rose, bringing her shoulders up, and padded further into the alleyway. Each step lasted, her hips coming to an absolute peak in height before she took another. She glanced from side to side and rubbed, slowly, her aching arm—though her phone weighed nothing, it hurt to hold it.

Past the trash cans, the flashlight illuminated a shiny metallic circle to the right. "A lid…" She scoffed. Bringing her good paw to her face for a moment, she squeezed the bridge between her eyes. "So stupid," she said with a chuckle. Putting her weight on a heel, she began to turn.

Her ears twisted to her back, to the sound of splitting air. A searing pain began in her left shoulder and carried down the length of her back to the side of her right stomach. She sucked in as she stumbled forward, hitting the wall with a shoulder. The rest of her body followed; darkness greeted her widened irises. Both of her arms rose to her stomach, injured one in front. And then the sound of tearing air and a breeze on her arm. The pain registered. But the slice in her back stole her focus with every beat of her rapid heart, the flesh stinging with each fresh dosage of blood.

A mass of black shifted. She tried to flash him with the light, then realized her phone had fallen from her grasp. But she heard the air—her ears swiveled towards the sound, and she pushed off from the wall. His claws dragged along it. Something growled. As adrenaline filled her veins, her paws spread out along the ground; her thighs tensed. The figure faded into the darkness, then reappeared alongside the sound, and hearing it, she feinted. Judy felt the fabric of her jacket flutter with the wind from a paw, gasped, and readied herself again. Sound betrayed him before sight did, so she relied on it. Doubled over, she feinted, and feinted, and feinted—avoiding the searing pain the claws brought in their wake. Her ears tracked the sound of his clothes, a noise the subtlest movements created, and dodged once she heard the air. A few of her own punches landed, but she knew they were ineffective. His flesh was too solid, too refined, for her weakened hits to hurt.

And as her body became accustomed to the adrenaline, the pain in her back and arms returned—worse on part of the stretching. With that, her body stopped listening. She told it to move, but it began to stick in place, the threat of further pain keeping the muscles locked in place—those impulses fell to her will. But they strengthened. With every fight against her body, her movements slowed, and his claws missed by less. She heard a laugh, a deep, piercing cackle, and she realized the beast was playing with her like a mouse. Judy froze. She'd stumbled into the middle of the alley; he circled her. She saw only darkness, but she knew.

She didn't hear the air before the claw sliced into her. Nor did she hear it the second time, or the third, or the many times after that. Her body stung—he'd slashed her arm, legs, stomach. Everything. As the assault continued, she felt a burning liquid sensation. It poured from her body, and she heard it pitter-pattering against the ground. And she sensed an impending presence behind her, unmoving, but he forced her continually closer to it.

Her rump hit the wall first.

He rushed forward, paws clamping around her shoulders, and slammed her into the wall. She grunted; her head swung back into the wall. His claws dug in, and she winced, then groaned as he lifted her up—the skin around the claws tore. Her jacket caught on the wall; cold brick touched her neck as the sweater moved down, but it stopped. The fabric caught on her throat. But he continued pushing up, choking her. Judy looked at the darkness, and she caught a glimmer of blue in his eyes.

"Hello." The voice—it was high pitched. Not like a prepubescent boy, but like a girl; it was the voice she often gave to the bitchy girls in novels, but filled with more spite. Judy shifted her shoulders, and sharp pain rippled from her shoulders through the rest of her body like a shockwave; she bit her lip to keep from crying out.

The blue eyes moved towards her left. Hot breath hit the edge of her ear, and Judy shivered. "I love…" She heard a sharp breath followed by a slow release. "I love when prey fights back…" A cold, wet object touched her cheek. She knew better than to move. That sensation traced up her cheek, ending at the base of her ear. "You'll taste—" The feeling shut Judy down. Her body stopped moving according to her will—it moved with instinct, an instinct that ignored pain, and her legs coiled up, tensing the muscles made for jumping, before releasing the tension directly below her assailant's chest.

As her paws connected, the claws in her shoulder retracted, and Judy fell to the ground; the slashes in her body drowned out the jolt to her spine. And while her instincts drove her, she heard the first sucking breath from her assailant. No time. Using the wall, she tried to stand, but fell forward. The paws that caught her collapsed under her weight. She hits the floor, but pushed up. Another sucking breath. For the first time, she noticed the blood covering the ground; it was this deep crimson. As she brought her paw out to pull herself away, the blood smudged over the cement, matting her paws with that dark red. Her life giving substance; she smeared it.

The attacker's breathing calmed. Judy scratched at the ground, dragging yet more blood across the cement, but her body stayed in place—her claws could not hook onto the pavement. As her nails scratched rock, the muscles in her neck contracted to the extreme, and her bottom lip moved down. The muscles in her arm stayed loose. With a whiff of air, a warm, rough presence fastened itself around the back of her neck.

Her face slammed down—the twitching nose hit first, sending shockwaves of pain radiating up her muzzle, which hit next. With this sensation, the claws sinking into the flesh of her neck were merely background noise. Deep in her nostrils, there was a sensation of moving liquid; the feeling stopped once it reached the end of her nose and resumed once it pooled and flowed to her mouth. The feeling of warmth brought her mind back under her control.

"Your desire to live is cute." The presence on her neck pushed down, rubbing Judy's face into the cement, and she gasped, the abrasions on her face bringing tears to her eyes. "But oh so futile." A weight came down onto her lower back. The claws in her neck released, and in their place, a paw pushed down on the back of her head, while the other pushes down between her shoulder blades. Judy struggled—the pain in her body fading away as a new rush of adrenaline floods her body—but the figure kept her pinned.

Hot breath hit the back of her neck. It felt wet, wet like the humidity that coated Judy when she walked out during a thunderstorm—and Judy had that same prickling sensation, like electricity was in the air. With the wounds on her neck, the breath stung. She winced as the breath grew heavier, as it came closer to her neck. A dry mouth opened behind her, and a wet object—no, a tongue—fell onto her bleeding wound. Judy screamed. Not out of pain, nor out of fear, but out of disgust created by the two.

The shrill wail reverberated against the walls of the alley, shooting out into the street. Escape. The light at the end of the tunnel, the place where she wished she had stayed. Were it not for her anxiety…

"Delicious…" it said. Against her neck, Judy felt teeth. The tongue lapped at her blood once more. Then the mouth snapped shut. Its teeth slice through her flesh, and the trickle of blood warmed her neck. She tried to scream. Tried. It pulled back, tearing off the flesh on the back of her neck. Her eyes widened, but returned to a glaze; no tears grew in her eyes; her eyes had no more tears to shed and no energy to create more. Behind her, the beast smacked—the sound of her dry mouth opening and closing filled Judy's ears as blood trickled down her neck. "You're so…" It stopped chewing. "SUCCULENT." It shifted, and she knew its neck bent to take another bite.

The alleyway illuminated. "Hey! Everything alright?"

It dragged Judy's face across the cement, pushing down harder—regardless, she cried out. After she turned her face to the side, wincing, only a low croak escaped her throat.

"Damn it," she said, pushing off of Judy. Her claws dug in one last time, then she took off down the alley. Judy tried to smile—tried to lift the left side of her face—but it remains emotionless.

"Hey!" The voice was feminine. Judy held up her head—blood dripped over the cleft of her lip. "Holy crap…" She bent next to Judy, and Judy tried to pull away, but none of her body moved. "Hello? Yeah," she breathed erratically, "there's a bunny here, and she's really beat up—my name's Ali Collins; there's a—I live at Savannah Place Apartments. And that's where she's at… we're in the alley." Ali brought her paw towards Judy, but pulled back. "Send help, please… quickly."

Judy looked away from the tiger. Again, she noticed the blood pooling under her and the smears she'd created—her life laid out around her, crimson and drying. She blacked out.


	3. Chapter 3

Nick could not help but think about the situation. This situation that could have robbed Judy of her life. Forever. Gone. His partner could have been stolen from him, and his actions could not have brought her back. He would have had to forever live with the regret of not sticking around last night, waiting to see if her night terrors came back. Though he knew about them, Nick didn't think to stay, and he cursed himself for his mistake. These emotions, hidden behind a façade of disinterest, only stockpiled—at some point, these hidden emotions of guilt and sadness, of hopelessness, have to break out from the graveyard he cast them into.

He paced the length of the room. With every step, the frown on his face changed, from pure anger, to worry, to sadness, then back to anger; it always went back to anger. As far as Nick saw it, anger was his best bet—it alone upheld the principle Nick lived his life by: not letting others see they get to him. He would not give them that pleasure, that sense of accomplishment at the sight of his tears. And so, he let those hidden emotions lash out as anger. Anger at the world, at the problems that had brought Judy into this hospital room. Anger at himself.

But, alongside that, anger at Judy.

Nick turned to look at her. With an IV pumping a clear goo into her, her mouth drooped like a wilting flower; her eyes had been replaced by an opaque glass, though Nick only saw that new style because her eyelids hung open—closing them constituted work, so they remained open. In the hospital bed, the white sheets covering her wounds, covering the shame Nick felt, lifted and fell in a rhythmic up and down. Up and down, again and again, in tune with the ticking of the clock. In his anger, this all meant nothing. On the sides of her face, the muscles twitched—she was trying to speak, Nick figured, and he perked his ears to listen, then realized it made no difference. The pain medication inhibited her ability to speak. So, Nick took over for her.

"Carrots…" It sounded sweet, as though he were about to confess his love, confess just how much seeing her there hurt him. "what the FUCK were you thinking? What the…" He growled, pacing again. "You could have been killed. Murdered. You could be fucking dead right now. DEAD." As he walked the room, his voice rose and fell in intensity, though it never sounded happy; then his voice hitched. "You could be dead…" He had stopped just at the side of her hospital bed, and his paws gripped the railing on the side—his face had inched over it. With his burst of anger finished, his emotions settled, he finally saw Judy's state. Her eyes, her mouth, her entire being—they all sent a crushing wave of helplessness through him. With it, a burning grew in his sinuses, a feeling that started water cascading into the pools of his eyes.

He crushed that feeling. As the tears began to form, the edges of his maw pulled back into a snarl, and a deep, resonating growl emanated from the middle of his throat—that anger lashed out at the wall of the hospital. His fist hit the wall first, followed by his head. Though his eyes closed at the impact, they opened and followed chips of the white plaster wall floating to the floor. A linoleum floor. And in the light of the hospital—that mechanical white sheen which made the entire place appear dead itself—the freshly polished floor presented Nick an image of himself.

In that reflection of furrowed eyebrows and bared fangs, he saw the faces that had ruined his spirit; the faces that had affixed a muzzle to his maw for fear of him eating them. The faces that had sneered at his tears, and ensured he would never become anything other than a sly fox.

Then he met Carrots.

At once, her state flashed again in front of his eyes—it blurred the image of anger glaring back at him, and he saw only her dead eyes. Emotionless. But as he pivoted his head on the wall to look at her, an odd sadness permeated the opaque glaze. Not fear, but worry for the fox.

That broke him. He flopped back, his butt falling into the chair beside her bed before the rest of his spine caught up, then leaned forward—each paw dug its way through his fur, haphazardly, as if grasping for some stronghold against this crushing hopelessness and guilt. "Oh, God…" The paws grasped at his fur, pulling it into painful bunches. "You could be dead… I'm…"

It starts as an obstruction of his vision, just around the bottom edge. As he tried to breath, the breath caught in his chest, coming out in a flurry of smaller, quick ones. The muscles in his arm tensed; he wanted that tensing to expel the emotions piling up inside his mind, but it failed, it failed, and the muscles loosened. The façade finally snapped. As the first tear, a single, light droplet, fell from his eye, he fell to the side, his head coming to rest on the railing of the hospital bed. That tear hit the floor and splashed into smaller and smaller puddles—eventually, it ceased to exist, but another took its place. Then another, and another, until the tears flowed from his eyes like a creek after a beaver's work is wrecked. "I'm—" a series of fast, fluttery breaths filled the air for a moment, then he continued. "So, so, sorry…" For a while, he continues like that. Apologizing, over and over, with the intermittent rapid breaths of a child who broke the rules on the playground—of a child with a muzzle.

Eventually, his sucking breaths returned to normal. He placed a paw on Judy's wrist, the one without the IV, and left it there. Blood flowed through the appendage, sending a steady, constant beat, again and again, through Nick's nerves. Those pulses became his time, and he became lost in even that—the sound of the ticking clock fell the sound of Judy's breath, and he sat there, entranced by it. For a time, perhaps; Nick didn't know. All he knew was the breath and the pulse, the pulse of the girl he loved. Both said she slept.

Nick took a breath, then released it steadily from his nostrils.

"Carrots… I don't think I'll ever have the guts to tell you this otherwise, so I love you. I know you said you love me in the cruiser that one time, but I still don't know. I don't know if you meant it like I did, y'know? You make me happy. I just can't tell if I make you happy… I always feel like you're just faking it. Faking it for the fox you saved. And that's part of it all. You saved me." He chuckled, rubbing a paw over an eye. "You saved me… and I couldn't even save you." For a while, silence filled the room. Nothing reached Nick's ears. "But I'll make whoever did this to you pay, Carrots. He messed with the wrong rabbit." His paw squeezed the wrist, gently, and he stood up. "I'll be back this evening." Though just for an instant, he had the impulse to kiss her. On the head, of course. Nothing like that. He just wanted her to know he meant it. But he went out the door.

Pain medication had slowed Judy's pulse and evened her breathing—every word of Nick's had reached Judy's ears. Though the medication kept her dull, she had plenty of time to think about the confession. Hours, alone, in the room of pure white. She'd always hated that about hospitals. Certainly, it made it easier to clean, to bleach, but was it really worth it? A splash of color, even some reds, would be reasonable. As she mulled over Nick's words, his confession of adoration, her thoughts bounced like this. The drugs made it mandatory. Since nothing else could occupy her time, she thought of his words in between her bouts of sleep.

Nick began by visiting the houses of the murders. In sequence, he went to each apartment and house, looking for anything the prior examiners might have missed; a single clue was all he required. Just something that would put him on the track to finding this murderer. Something. Anything. Despite his desire, however, he found only sadness and death in the places he visited. The examiners missed nothing, yet the files remained empty, not a single scrap of evidence left aside from the "x" marked in the victims' left shoulder. Really, that was about all that remained of the victims. The rest of them had been picked clean. And as he went to the alleyway where Judy had been attacked, Nick thought of finding her like the friends and family of the other victims had found their allies their loved ones: nothing but a shoulder of meat connected to a network of bloody bones.

Nick threw up into a sewer grate beside the alley.

After wiping the brown goo off his muzzle, he lifted the tape blocking the entrance and walked in. Judy's blood still stained the concrete floor. It had taken on this almost black appearance, having lost its oxygen. A shudder racked Nick's body from head to toe, and as he sidled along the outside of the viable scene, he saw the bits of Judy's fur the claws had ripped out, the smudges of her blood as she raked her paws across the cement; that same sensation to barf overtook him. With a paw over his mouth, he kept it in and made it to the bloody pawprints.

They weren't large—about the size of a weasel or a small fox. The subtle differences between the various potential pawprints had been lost as the blood from each step melded together from the puddle it created, however—and by the time the blood would have dried before it coagulated, the prints stopped. She'd taken off her shoes. Nick cursed, and glared at the prints. They stopped right at the end of the alley, and Nick exited from the other end. With a glance around the once-again populated street, animals rushing up and down the streets while cars traveled the road, he thanked God. The alley had been a theater where only the death of his comrade played, again and again, while he sat powerless. But now, in the fading light of the afternoon sun, surrounded by the active life of the city, he felt all at once safe and secure. He wished Judy would have experienced that same security.

Nick bumped—literally—into an old friend from high school. After he pulled away and apologized, she immediately recognized his face. "Nicky!" she said, punching him in the shoulder. "It's been forever."

Rubbing his shoulder with a meek grin, he laughed. "Suzanne! How long has it been? High school?"

"Sounds about right." She was a cheetah, through and through, but her height and bulk failed to accentuate the deadly speed and grace her species had become renowned for; needless to say, track had never been her sport, though she could still outrun most animals without breaking a sweat. 'Just an advantage,' she used to say.

In place of running, Suzanne dove into her studies. Far as he knew, she'd gotten into a prestigious college of medicine in Karakum, a desert city built a few hundred years ago—she deserved it, he thought. Even then, the sensation of her bed remained fresh, just the same as the posters adorning her walls—mostly bands—and the bouncy ball he always tossed in the air while she studied. After she finished, though, the two always cracked open a six-pack. Nick had still never found anyone who could pack away as much alcohol as Suzanne did without passing out, and she used that ability to party, hard, while studying the morning after; Nick loved that. But as time did, they found themselves meeting up less and less as high school ended—and even those sporadic meetups ended after she left for college.

They talked about life. Suzanne spoke of her time at the university—the anxiety and all—and Nick listened, ears perking every now and again, just as a laugh resonated from his chest here and there. And when Nick spoke about his life, a smile remained plastered on his face throughout—even in the parts where he lived on the street because, after it all, he knew he would come to meet Judy. "Let me tell you about Carrots," he began. She brought him out of the stereotypes he had decided to abide by; she taught him that he could be more than just a hustling fox. Something like, say, a police officer.

If Suzanne had been drinking, she'd have choked. "A police officer. You?! Hustlin' Nick?"

This time, he hit her in the shoulder, causing her to pause for a moment before they walked further. "I'd say don't act surprised, but I get it. I didn't think I'd ever stop selling Pawp-sicles. But she's… she's amazing. It's a little bit hard to explain, but she made me believe in myself."

"Sounds like someone has a crush," she said, a wide grin spread splitting her maw in two. Nick looked away, trying to keep his maw from mimicking hers. "You said she was at the hospital, right? Not the one in tundra town, right?"

"Nah, Savanah Central. It's about a mile from the police station."

"Ah! Yeah, I know the one. Specializes in smaller animals, if I recall. I'm working at the one in Tundra Town."

The pair sat on a bench—a small bit of gauze poked out from the side of her tank-top, like a binder. "Yo, how'd your hurt your chest?"

She glanced down at herself, then back at Nick. "Oh, just pulled a few muscles working out. It's nothing big. Hurts like hell to breath, but that's what I get for going too hard."

"Pff, you can probably lift more than I, Suzze"

Across the street, a courthouse blocked the last rays of the sunlight from them on the street. But in that darkness, the LED of a clock illuminated the time on its analog display. "Crap! I've got to get back to the hospital, but we need to catch up. Want to grab some coffee sometime?"

"Totally!" They exchanged numbers, and Nick jumped from the bench.

"See ya, Suzze!"

As Nick ran, he did not hear her sigh of relief.

Nick entered the hospital room; the evening sun failed to make the room any more lively. Only Judy did that. That evening, she slept, and Nick slept by her, resting his head on the hospital bed—he dreamed of a family of boxes. Bunny foxes. Maybe funnies? He never quite figured it out in the dream. All he knew was that he loved them.

The next day, Nick waited outside the room while the doctors removed the IV and verified the quality of the sutures—as soon as the doctors went out the door, he entered and sat next to the bed. Again, it was evening.

"I've missed hearing that voice, Carrots." He smiled, looking at her eyes. Once more, that light purple shone through, and it pierced the sadness plaguing him, obliterating it.

"Well, I've had no shortage of yours;" her voice was still raspy, every soundwave rolling around in her throat for a moment before coming out, a little beaten up. Still, her playful sarcasm came through. "But, Nick—" She stopped herself with a forced cough.

"Yeah?"

"Never mind. Nothing important."

That paw finds itself around Judy's wrist once more—right on the spot he'd begun carving for himself there. "You alright?"

"Yeah. Just. It's not important." She grinned, but the forced movement of muscle was clear.

He furrowed his eyebrows. "Sounds like something someone who had something important to say would say."

Judy laughed, and shook her head just a little. Anything more would hurt. Partly to change the subject and partly to speak the truth, she said: "I did miss with this back and forth, though, Nicky."

"Me too, Carrots." He squeezed her wrist, then continued to speak. "So, you totally missed Bogo yesterday—I guess he's gotten this new interest in Justin Beaver…"

And so they spoke until the sun ceased to light the room, replaced by the imperceptible glow of the moon. At some point, the white lights above had flickered on. They reached a point where they simply sat, enjoying the presence of one another—to Nick, this felt like the heaven he had imagined: constantly satiated with this odd presence of happiness and joy that radiated from his very core, but felt as though it was fueled externally.

However, Nick had to end that feeling; the information of the case needed to be recorded. Nick's face strained, and he finally asked her about the attack. Immediately, her face scrunched into a frown, but it faded quickly. "Yo, wait, we don't have to talk about it. It can wait." In reality, he needed the information—this time with Judy had distracted him, but as he thought about the case once more, the lack of a detail, some connection between the cases, had begun to drive him mad. Nick required this information. He needed it to find her attacker…

"It's fine, Nick. I can talk about it." Though she did not say it, she had already repressed the worst bits. Those bits that drove her insane while she sat, helpless, in that room which shifted between light and dark at random, were already gone.

So, she talked. She explained why she left that house—the night terrors that continued to plague her—and why she entered the alleyway

"Stupid, huh?"

Judy expected a yes. She expected him to demean her, tell her just how stupid her actions had been. Just how irrational. Instead, Nick's eyebrows furrowed, and a light, incredulous laugh escapes his mouth in a breath. "No, Carrots. Not stupid at all. Brave, I'd say." She felt a squeeze on her wrist, right where the presence of Nick's paw had faded away, and she smiled. "But that's pretty typical for you."

"Thanks, Nick…" She swallowed, then continued, the smile on her face fading into an emotionless line. "Yeah. So, I heard a noise in the alley, and I investigated. There've been too many rapes in the area lately to ignore sounds like that." She continued, explaining just how the enemy sprung on her and overcame her—the rending and tearing, though, she crossed over. They were non-critical.

"At some point, I got her—."

"Her?" he asked, tilting his head a little to the side.

"Yeah, her. Surprising, I know. I thought it was a guy, too, at first." She cleared her throat, and nodded towards the water. Nick brought it up, and she took a sip from it, then let him take it back. "Thanks. Anyway, she pinned me against the wall, but she didn't really think about my legs—I was able to coil them up and slam them into her chest—."

"Wait, in the chest?"

"Yeah, why?"

At once, Nick's paw left her wrist, and he sprung out of the chair—it fell behind him, clanging on the linoleum. Without saying a word, his paws screeched against the floor and he bolted towards the door.

"Nick!" Even though she yelled, it barely reached his ears, and her throat hurt after.

"I figured it out. Stay here. Don't let anyone in."

"Yeah, right." She winced getting up, but she slid her legs off of the hospital bed and jumped off—her legs would have given way had Nick not rushed back in to grab her. She growled, but not at Nick.

"Carrots…"

"Dang it… I'd only be a hindrance. Dang it…" She bit her lip to keep from crying, her large, front teeth pushing into the flesh of her lip. In this moment, the cop felt useless, like a bunny in the hands of a lion. "Promise me you won't get hurt like me. Promise."

Nick put his paw in hers, then covered it with the other. "Promise." With that, he released both and ran through the door; as he ran down the hallway, about six feet wide, he dialed Clawhauser's number. 5-8-8-7-5-4-2-6-9-4. Each number required more time to enter than Nick had hoped; just bringing his claw over the numbers required precious time.

The phone came up to his ear. It rang twice, then he heard the light voice of Clawhauser.

"He—."

"Clawhauser, no time. I'm going to need back up at the Tundra Town hospital."

Clawhauser fumbled on the phone, dropping it once before picking it up and typing on a keyboard—as he did so, Nick turned down a second hallway, identical to the one he had just come from. He went to the right. "Done," Clawhauser said, "but why?"

"The 'X' Killer is Suzan Fastlee. Cheetah. I need you to send a patrol to pick me up and keep Judy safe. I'm—." He slammed headlong into something, something that sent him falling onto his rump with a grunt.

"Gah, sorry!" He looked up to see Suzan.

"Hey, Nick? How's it going?" She held her arms behind her back—a wide smile creased her maw.

He snarled. "You bitch. Send—."

The piercing pain reached his brain before his eyes perceived the movement of her arms. His paw spasmed in response to the pain, and the phone dropped to the ground. When he turned to look at the origin of the pain, his shoulder, he saw a syringe filled with a tan, bubbling liquid. Before he could open his mouth, Suzanne pushed down on the plunger, sending the liquid flooding into his body—the feeling of it entering sent a shiver chasing up his arm, and then his muscles went rigid.

"Now, Nick." He could not figure out how, but he ended up facing down the hallway he had run down a moment ago. Towards the corridor Judy lay in. No, no, no…

Judy appeared first, a gleaming silver held to her throat, followed by a large, male tiger. Her eyes locked on Nick, and a single tear rolled down her face. Nick knew it was not out of fear—standing up to Mr. Biggs had shown her fearlessness in the face of death. She shed it for him.

"Awwww, cute. She's crying for you. Or maybe for herself? Both? Who knows, who cares." She bent down next to Nick, her face just inches from his ear, and gave a light-hearted sigh. "She's at my mercy, y'know. I could tell my buddy Samuel here to kill her at any time." At this point, the tiger had stopped just a few feet from Nick and Suzanne. Close enough to grab, if only he could move.

With a snap of her fingers, the knife pierced into Judy's throat. Just barely, but enough to spawn a small trickle of blood that moved down her gray neck. Judy whined and struggled in the grip to no avail; the muscles in his arm didn't even budge.

"So, here's the deal, buddy-ol-pal. I'll keep her alive. Begrudgingly. In return, you'll be my eyes and ears—"she pauses to flick one ear—" and most especially ears, at the ZPD. You'll keep them off my tail so that I can keep on killing and eating." She placed a paw on his shoulder. "But I want to make sure you know to keep your end. That's partly why I immobilized you, so you wouldn't struggle too much watching this. Just, y'know, watch." She brought her face a little closer to his, making her breath blow directly into his eyes. "Far as you convinced me, you really like this girl. I'm sure you'd love to marry her or some mushy crap like that." Her face turned to look at Judy and Samuel. "And that's why I want you watch her get fucked. I want you to watch her get taken while you can do nothing."

Samuel removed the knife from Judy's throat and let her drop to the floor. She landed expertly, right on her thighs in preparation to jump, but the beast fell on her the instant she touched the ground. Large claws tore at the hem of her shirt, which she'd tucked into her yoga pants—she heard the shirt tear. Nick groaned, and fell forward. Judy looked to him; his chin rested on the floor, and his butt stuck up in the air. She saw the shimmer of tears welling in his eyes, and she heard the groans. Her eyes flicked side to side in the hallway, and the intense red of a fire alarm caught her attention… if…

She felt the paws of the beast atop her edge the hem of her pants, and while he grabbed it, accompanied by an involuntary jolt on her part, she felt that his weight prevented them from ripping them far enough. Her chance presented itself. With a grunt, the monster got up—no more than a couple inches—and moved himself down.

Judy took her opportunity. The muscles in her arm tightened, and she flipped around using that arm as a pivot point—during that flip, she drew her legs up, wincing as the sutures in her thigh snapped one by one. Samuel's claws ripped through the hem of her yoga pants as the pain shot up her thighs, straight to her leg. She landed on her back, then released the tension. Released it straight into his balls.

Immediately, his eyes rolled back into his head, and he fell back, hitting the ground with a guttural groan, like a dying animal. Judy scrambled away, now feeling that familiar feeling of warm blood rolling down her legs, and stood up with a tight jaw. Behind her, he retched. The sound of splattering vomit filled the dead-silent hallway.

"No!" Suzanne screamed. Bending down to build power, she leaped at the bunny, claws outreached like a large hug.

But Judy dove to the ground, and the short cheetah flew into the wall with a resounding thud. Judy recovered, and pulled down the lever of the fire alarm.

Blaring sirens blasted in the hallway alongside flashing white lights. From above, sprinklers clicked on and blasted water over the four. It smelled horrible—the water felt heavy.

Those sensations remained with Judy as she saw the blood from her torn wounds flow down her body once more; diluted in the water, the blood splashed artistically. It swished around, making a wispy, mono-color representation of a life like the work of Van-Gopher. Those light reds mixed with the continuing stream of barf from behind, and the mixture darkened the picture, wiping it out with dark greens and yellows.

Judy leaned against the alarm, the alternating tones of the siren drowning out her pants. They'd survived. They…

"You… stupid… bitch…"

Judy's head jerked to look at Suzanne, eliciting a groan of pain from Judy. Suzanne had stood up, keeping herself steady with a paw flat against the white wall of the hospital, but her eyes flittered around without focus.

Concussion, Judy thought. She thanked God—with her condition, she'd need that kind of advantage to keep from dying. Casting one more glance at Nick, lying flat, expressionless behind her, she left the wall and stood on her feet. Though her thighs burned with an alarming pain, she continued to stand.

Suzanne walked like a drunk, swaying haphazardly to either side, from the wall, before she settled with her legs spread apart, paws raised to protect her face; as she stepped forward towards Judy, she swung one paw towards Judy, claws outstretched.

Judy pivoted on her heel, swiveling outside of the paw's arc. Suzanne stumbled forward, faltering forward into the paw she had swung—Judy hit with a swift punch in her stomach. With throaty coughs, she stumbled out of range. A grimace crunched Judy's face. Blood steadily flowed from her wounds, and Judy's thighs began to shake with the mere waves of pain. On the edges of her vision, the white light flying over the walls made them look like clouds. Heaven. Justice.

"I'll kill… you" Suzanne panted, facing Judy again now. Her stance resembled a sleepwalking child, unaware of the world around her—with her spine bent forward, she stumbled towards Judy. She allowed her approach. And when Suzanne lifted a paw, Judy merely moved to the side, the appendage falling into air, and slammed her own paw straight into the base of Suzanne's ribcage.

A sound like a retch escaped her mouth, then she dropped to her knees, followed by her face.

Judy panted, a light sweat coating her skin, and turned to Nick; in the afterglow of the fight, the finality of it all, she felt no pain. Her entire body seemed irrelevant. All that mattered was Nick. Nick… she walked towards him, each step hitting the linoleum floor with a sound that penetrated through the blaring alarm.

Finally, Judy reached him. The syringe came out of Nick's skin with a single pull, and she began to help him up—at first, he only fell. His muscles were still not entirely under his control, and it forced Judy to fall down more than once in trying to get him on his own two feet. Only then did she begin to feel the blood flowing from her opened wounds. That, alongside the pain, brought a grimace to her face. She cursed into Nick's face.

And then she felt two large paws grab her shoulders.

Samuel. No. She had forgotten about Samuel. He pulled her away from Nick, and a paw bent her neck to one side, much like vampires did in films, and exposed the tender, already partially eaten flesh—she could feel him rear to take a bite. He brought his head back, and opened his maw. She struggled, but like before, the muscles did not budge.

Nick tried to work with Judy, he really did, but his muscles simply would not contract as he asked them to. Judy got him on his feet once or twice, but he needed her to act as a solid crutch, lest he simply fell down. And so, when she was pulled away, he fell to his knees, then to his chest.

From his position on the ground, he saw the beast hold Judy in his arms and bring her neck to the side—he saw his mouth slowly approach, slowly threaten death.

Before, the adrenaline that pumped through his body had no effect—too much of the drug was present, keeping his body from moving a single solitary muscle. But the concentration in his body had dropped, and as he saw the scene unfolding in front of him, the rapid beating of heart and breath cleansed enough of the paralyzing serum to bring his muscles back under his control.

Nick stood up, his legs shaking beneath him to the point of his knees hitting one another. He knew his punches would not prevent him from biting her. So, he threw himself at the pair instead. As his body hit, his weight knocked Judy into Samuel, and he fell backward with the weight of both of them. And from that position, Nick had the ability to put some strong force into a punch—he threw it, arcing around Judy, into the beast's cheek. Samuel yowled in pain. The skin of his cheek had been shoved into his teeth, and Nick knew that, for his fist ached with the pain of punching bone. He shook it to assuage the pain, then hit him again, on the opposite cheek, then once again on the first cheek. Samuel took his paws from Judy's shoulders to protect his face, then spit blood to the side.

Nick pushed from the floor and grabbed Judy, heaving her away from the fight—her adrenaline rush had already transpired. Twice. And now, it took all of her will to not faint because of her pain, radiating from each of her wounds. Nick knew that, and stood in front of her.

The beast rose, blood dribbling from his mouth, and it mixed with the vomit and water covering the linoleum floor of the hospital. While he still lacked balance, struggling to find proper footing on the slippery floor as well as a more than dazed from the punches Nick threw at him, Nick came forward and swiped his stomach twice with a claw, eliciting two roars, and then slammed him in the chest with a fist. The beast choked on the air in his lungs, spitting it out alongside more blood, then slipped onto his back.

Finally, finally, Nick felt the weight of the encounter lift from his shoulders. Judy came up with a paw, and he acted as crutch to remove her from the building—he made it into the lobby before the firemen rushed through the front and assisted them the rest of the way. The front door was awash with various blues; Nick stumbled into that familiar glow, Judy by his side, and saw the cops and firetrucks lining the streets. "How…"

"You never turned off the phone, Wilde. Good thing, too." Chief Bogo said.

"T-They're inside. No fire."

Bogo signaled with his hoof towards the door, and a battalion of blue rushed through the door. At the same time, two suits of yellow—firefighters, he assumed—came and took Judy from him and began to attend her wounds—two animals dressed in light blues came from the side, too. Doctors from the hospital, he figured. One came to him, too, and began to look him over. Just the typical maneuvers. Talk, move your arm, move your leg, follow me with your eyes—he went through the hoops. But all the while, he thought of Hopps. The thoughts of a world without her, a world in which she had died in the alleyway, faded after the fight—in their place, came the creation of a world in which she said "I love you." She'd said it before. But he wanted her to say it again, and to mean it, for certain, in the way Nick wanted.

And in the comfort of Judy's home, as the two sat and watched Netflix, Nick's hopes became reality. "I love you."


End file.
